


Creidsinn Ann An Gaol (Believe in Love)

by AlexSeanchai (EllieMurasaki)



Category: Brave (2012)
Genre: 5 Things, ADHD Character, Epistolary, F/M, Male-Female Friendship, Period-Typical Sexism, autistic characters, blink-and-you-miss-it reference to bodily mutilation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-02
Updated: 2017-12-02
Packaged: 2019-02-09 12:34:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,351
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12887973
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EllieMurasaki/pseuds/AlexSeanchai
Summary: Four suitors Merida turned down and one she didn't.





	Creidsinn Ann An Gaol (Believe in Love)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [magpie mountains (hollowmen)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hollowmen/gifts).



> the_rck, you are a fantastic beta, thank you lots! Thank you as well to rosefox, for an important tweak. :)

**Dougal Macintosh**

The chess pieces scattered across the floor.

"And that shall be that," said Merida, cutting off Dougal Macintosh's storming. She snatched him by the arm and tossed him over her shoulder, then bent to begin picking up the chess pieces. "I shan't marry _you_ , Macintosh," she added without a glance back.

She'd been winning, too. Of course, after his displays upon losing at swordplay and archery, his overturning the chessboard wasn't a surprise...

(Sure and Eithne Duncan of Clan MacGuffin turned up three months pregnant two months later, swearing by Golden Áine that Dougal was the father. Of course, by then Eithne would have none of Dougal Macintosh. Though her parents and his insisted they wed for the child's sake, she declared, "I won't wed a man who loves only himself!")

**Rory Dingwall**

"I'm a changeling," Rory Dingwall told Merida in full seriousness. "That's why I'm odd."

"Is that so?" Merida asked. She'd heard the stories of changeling children—every Celtic child had—and it would be no bad thing to ally Clan Dunbroch, and all four Clans of Fergus's kingdom, with the Fair Folk.

But Rory had certainly not grown up among the Fair Folk; a son of theirs or not, who among them would back him?

"Aye," said Rory. "My ma tells me she tried every trick she could to get _them_ to take me back and return her own lad, but _they_ were having none—HEY!" He leaped up and pelted back down the hill. "Hey now, what do you think you're doing there, my lads?"

Merida's brothers scattered at Rory's approach (or perhaps at Merida's). Kenna looked up, startled out of the tears they'd caused. "My lady," said the young Clan Macintosh woman (a changeling child herself, Maudie had said a time or two when Kenna didn't look to be listening) to Merida, and "my lord" to Rory, and looked down again, at her embroidery hoop with a jagged hole through Kenna's precise stitchery and jam stains on the threads.

Remembering Elinor's tapestry, Merida's stomach plummeted the height of the castle tower.

"Oh, dear," said Rory, taking Kenna's hand. "Hours of work, gone to waste..."

"Months," said Kenna, and sniffled. "I'd my head in the clouds again—they'd not have sneaked up on me if I could _listen_ while stitching—"

"BOYS!" roared Merida.

(She might have thought longer about wedding Rory Dingwall—but it hardly mattered that Merida wouldn't have any man who couldn't match her in a spar, after Rory met Kenna.)

**Willie MacGuffin**

> Forgive me for my hesitation in addressing you face to face. I find I am ill suited to lead, if that must mean speaking before many people, any of whom are strangers—as of course it must. You, my lady Merida, are a stranger to me, and so my tongue ties when I speak to your face. A better poet might say that's for your beauty, but I find poets often lie...
> 
> My brother Eoghan tells me I'm a fool to think it unfair all round that our parents insist you marry Young Macintosh or Wee Dingwall or myself, with no other choices presented. (I suspect he is jealous!) You should have the same freedom any other young woman is granted, and I can't think I or anyone would long enjoy being wed to someone as strong as you and unwilling. I imagine you know full well how to geld a horse; I prefer to remain a stallion!
> 
> And truth be told, I prefer to mount a stallion as well.
> 
> —And what are your two rejected suitors to do, marry each other? I shouldn't mind Rory Dingwall's lifelong companionship, but after Dougal Macintosh had his little fit of temper at the Games before you shot for your own hand, I should think neither you nor I would want to spend much time with him!
> 
> [...]
> 
> My sister Teàrlag insists I ask whether you love me, or think you could come to love me, before I ask if you find yourself willing to consider offering me your hand in marriage. In truth I hadn't thought to ask myself, before she spoke, if I love you or think I could. I think I could indeed, and if you think the same of me, then we might do well building a life together. But I do not think I do...and how sad it would be, if we were to marry each thinking we could love the other and never coming to it.

(Merida replied:) 

> _I can't say as I'm sure of what love is._
> 
> _Tell Teàrlag I thank her for her words to you, as that question has me thinking. My mother mopes when my father is away, however she hides it, and smiles when they have been kissing, and if that is love then I bear none for you, Willie._
> 
> _Friends?_

(Willie's response:) 

> If that is love, then I have to wonder what Aidan mac Neachtain thinks of me! I write him more often than you, I confess, and though I have imagined kissing you, somehow every daydream of kissing you turns into one of kissing him...
> 
> (Teàrlag tells me I'm a fool.)
> 
> Yes. Friends.

**Cormac Campbell**

Cormac, younger prince of Clan Campbell, kissed Merida's hand delicately and spoke of her hair, red as roses. She found herself blushing at the heat in his green eyes. Later, he couldn't defeat her at swordplay, but he almost could have—even though he _had_ insulted her by insisting they not use live steel. The exertion was not the only reason she found herself panting for breath and grinning wildly. Sweat glistened on his face; she wiped her own away. And at dinner, his tale of fighting Roman legions—well, boasting was boasting, but it rang with truth.

Merida began to tell the story of when Queen Elinor had been a bear—

"You lie," said Cormac, dismissive.

"Say that so they can hear you," Merida commanded, voice ringing throughout the hall, and all around faces turned to Merida.

"I said," Cormac repeated firmly, "you lie."

"And why do you say that?" asked Merida, who had barely embellished a word.

Cormac hesitated, but Merida glared and he started talking: "Magic is nothing but trickery and sleight of hand. 'Tis one thing to boast, another to lie!"

A shocked hush fell over Clan Dunbroch.

"Aye, and _you_ shan't be seeking my hand in marriage," said Merida.

**Tam Baird**

Merida watched in wonder as the wandering storyteller Tam Baird summoned illusion-swans to illustrate his tale of the Children of Lir. The ethereal swans dipped and swirled through the hall as he plucked his lute strings to give the swans voice.

She found him after dinner shaping illusions for little Muireall Duncan and Elspeth Dingwall to wonder at. Eithne and Kenna were nowhere to be found—Merida couldn't blame them for taking the chance to rest when they got it; Elspeth never stopped running and Muireall never stopped talking—but Rory was there, entirely as entranced until Merida's incautiously loud footfall drew his attention.

Rory got up without a word and came over to Merida. "Are you worried about the storyteller-witch?" he asked bluntly.

"I don't know if we need to be," Merida answered. Such a power could be a great ally in peace or war, or a great enemy, or only—'only'—an embellishment of legends. "Clan MacGuffin arrives tomorrow—if I need help, you and Willie will back me?"

"And Aidan," said Rory, as if that needed mentioning. "Dougal too, if he has any sense in his pretty head," Rory added, and Merida smiled.

"Merida, Merida!" shrieked Muireall, gleeful, and the storyteller looked over and saw Merida there.

He smiled, brown eyes warm and sparkling. "Princess Merida," he said, and dipped forward in a seated bow. "I hope, later, you will honor me by telling your tale of Queen Elinor's time as a bear? I heard from Clan Campbell that four clans attest its truth, and though I spin tales poorly, such a tale deserves song and story."

"I may," said Merida, feeling light. "I may indeed."


End file.
